Diner Survey Results 6 responses

Reviews

Good sushi, but not the best

Kyoto is a good option for sushi in the Phoenix area, although not the best. The sushi is excellent quality and creative, offering several rolls which you don’t find at every sushi bar. The spicy tuna toll and the caterpillar roll are among the better rolls. Price is very reasonable. The grill is mediocre, and while the food is fairly decent(I had the chicken) , the presentation is severely lacking when compared with other Japanese restaurants in the area.
Overall, I’d give it three stars, all of which are for the good sushi. Also, as a side note, It would be very nice to see the restaurant updated and renovated into a more elegant space.

Hmm

My husband and friends and family (12 of us) dined here last night as a birthday treat for me. Fortunately we had reservations or we would never have been seated.

The place is very cramped, low ceilings and tight seating. You walk in the door and and are hit with the odor of an aquarium (not in a good way) there is a very small area to wait. The bar was standing room only. We ordered a couple of beers and the bartender thought we said sake bombers. He was quick to correct the mistake. After this we began our wait. Our 8pm reservation turned in to a 9pm seating. Once seated, it was 10 minutes before we were offered beverages, and another 10 before our order was taken. We received a bowl of Miso soup garnished with green onion and quarter-size slices of dried mushroom that were still in their dried state. Quite tasteless overall. Next came the small salad of iceberg lettuce, tomato and a radish slice smothered in something that resembled curdled peanut butter with a faint hint of ginger. Awful… Eventually the chef came out and served us each two sauces, both very bland. He banged his spatula and tongs around on the teppanyaki grill several times and tossed them in the air and lit our plates on fire. He followed that with slicing, stacking onions into a cone and lighting it on fire……The chef was very pleasant and talked to us a bit as he sliced and diced each entree and plated it. I had the Lobster, Shrimp and Scallop combo. It was ok, but he had drowned everything in lemon juice and what I ended up with was chewy bits of seafood that tasted like lemon juice…no seafood flavor. My husband, who is not a fan of fish or seafood, chose the beef tenderloin. The chef made no attempt to clean off the remains of the seafood and lemon juice off the grill before preparing the beef. My husband and the others remarked that the beef and a “fishy” taste. Somewhere during all of this, they brought the sushi we had ordered. The portions were good, but just didn’t taste like much. I ordered Flying Fish eggs (the pieces were too large to eat in a single bite, a knife would have been nice, but was not provided), Alaskan Roll, California Roll, Tempura Shrimp Roll (actually tasted like something besides rice and nori), and a scallop appetizer of tiny scallops served in a foil boat and smothered in a sauce of mayo and cheese (this had flavor and the scallops were tender, but tasted mostly of mayo). I actually prefer the sushi at AJs Fine Foods (a high-end grocery) and at every place I’ve ever eaten it. We were never offered refills on our drinks; we had to flag down a waitress each time. This was the first teppinyaki and sushi experience for most of the group and they seemed satisfied (out of ignorance) and with the fact that it was free (my husband paid). The prices were reasonable (12 of us at e and drank for $350), the service was ok, the atmosphere was cheesy Japanese, the food was not worth a return trip.

I would have tipped much less had there not been a built in 18 percent gratuity.

Dishes Tried:

Dinamite Scallops

Ok…tiny tender scallops in a foil boat smothered with a sauce that tasted like mayo with a hint of cheese.

Worst restaurant in Downtown Scottsdale

Working in downtown Scottsdale, I utilize most of the restaurants on a regular basis - but not this one, never again. After being informed by the manager that "the customer is never right" when we asked to be seated before all eight of our…

Kyoto

Kyoto was a fun place to go for tepanyaki. We did have to wait quite a while to get in. Because there weren't enough of us to fill a table, we had to wait for a smaller party to join us. The chef was funny and the food tasted very good.